U2 · popmart · oakland · 19 jun 97

20 photos pulled from two rolls.

Before entering the stadium on the 18th, I went to the box office and they had a single decent floor seat; I think it was center section row 30. I turned it down, since there was nobody else at the box office and I for some reason wanted to go think about it. When I came back a half hour later, that ticket was gone -- but there was one in the b-stage section, about row 25. I bought it, and as I headed to my seat on the 18th I learned the wonderful truth -- the ticket I'd just gotten from the box office was the closest seat to the railing at the inside corner of the catwalk and the b-stage. Yahoo!

Not that I was ever in the seat, of course. I got right on the railing and stayed there. Being there officially, I learned something I wish I'd learned back in Vegas -- not everyone there was there with a ticket for that section, and because there were no seats right next to the railing, it really was some sort of free-for-all kind of deal, depending on how local security felt.

I thought the show was even better than the night before, and it was LOUD; felt pretty cool. There was even more of "All I Want Is You" -- wonderful -- and "If You Go To San Francisco" was a nice Karaoke song; I didn't know it, and it was my first trip to San Francisco since I was very little so it added nicely to the experience.

I was again shooting with the little cheap camera, but it worked fairly well. A few of these shots are my absolute favorites.

U2photos.com is a collection of
nearly 3,000 original live
concert photos of U2
by Otto Kitsinger taken during
six tours and twenty years.